Ganbatte ne, Oirokechan
by yasuhei
Summary: Just a single momentary and chance meeting can sometimes have the power to change a whole lot. What will Naruto do if he wants the prize badly enough? Training just got a whole lot sexier.
1. Part one

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Gannbatte ne, Oiroke-chan

A Naruto crack-fanfic

By yasuhei

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Part one

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It wasn't much of a difference really, just a few careless, scornful words from a chunin Naruto had never even met before.

"What the hell are you doing Jiraiya-sama? The second most powerful ninja in our village deserves better than to have a brat like you following him around. You should just leave him alone."

The chunin's face didn't even register in his mind, but his words echoed in his head like the tolling of some massive bell.

The second most powerful ninja... Naruto _really_ had to get that man to train him.

It wasn't much of a difference, but it was enough.

---

"Then will you supervise my training?"

"Yes, but there is one condition... You must remain in that form whenever you are with me."

Naruto could feel her eyebrows twitching, her jaw clenching instinctively. That idiot! That stinking stupid pervert! She almost let her control over her jutsu slip, almost told him exactly what it was she thought of him, but...

_...Second most powerful ninja in the village..._

And there was Hinata too. She'd seen her in her dreams last night, first standing injured and defiant against that asshole he now had to fight, and then later, lying battered, bruised and unconscious. Naruto barely knew the girl, but she still deserved vengeance, and she certainly didn│ft deserve to go around believing that she would always have to play second fiddle to her ass of a cousin just because some stupid fate decreed it. Even Naruto himself... she didn't want people in the village believing all those things about destiny and fate, because one day she was going to be Hokage, no matter what fate had to say about it.

"Alright..." her voice was quiet for once. She might need the damn pervert's help, but she didn't mean she had to like what he wanted her to do.

"What was that?" The old man looked taken aback, surprised even.

"I said Alright," she repeated. Louder this time, irritated, "I'll stay like this if you promise to train me."

The old man's huge grin spread back out across his face, and Naruto wondered if she'd been wrong. Maybe he hadn't been surprised at all before, or maybe he'd just misheard her. He reached his arm right out and placed it on top of her head. Gently mussing her hair.

"Alright. A deal's a deal after all. What should I call you?"

---

"What the hell was wrong with my other clothes?"

It was hard to keep respecting the toad sanin when he kept grinning like that every time he looked over her.

"What's the point of me agreeing to teach you if you look like a babe if you just go and cover yourself with those stupid baggy orange clothes. Anyway, were at a river, and babes are supposed to wear bikinis at the river."

Naruto grumbled to herself, but conceded the point. The swimming costume that Jiraiya had given her didn't even have any orange in it, being white with pale blue flowers instead. At least it did a fairly good job of covering her up, for a bikini, but she was still determined that if the old man was going to keep making her do this that she'd buy herself a bikini tomorrow. Anything had to be better than something he'd chosen for her, and she'd feel more like herself if she could at least manage to wear something orange.

"Okay then Naru-chan, why don│ft you try walking on the water again."

"Stupid Ero-senin! My name's Naruto, not Naru!"

"Hmm," the older man said, turning away from her, his voice suddenly completely uninterested, "Naruto doesn't sound much like the name of the sort of sexy babe who I'd want to train."

"Wait, I didn't mean that..."

"Well then! Naru-chan it is!" and suddenly he was all smiles again, and Naruto was feeling both stupid and confused, "Well then Naru-chan, try to walk on the water again."

She stepped off the bank and onto the water's surface as gently as she could, trying to keep the chakra flow steady, and regulate it as the water shifted beneath her. It had been tricky enough to start with, but now while she had to keep her chakra trickling into the oiroke no jutsu as well, the task was near impossible. She wobbled, her feet sinking beneath the surface of the water. She turned slightly, hoping her new sensei would have advice that might save her. Instead he was staring hard at her now bare midriff.

It turned out that the water here was quite cold.

Shivering slightly, she pulled herself up from the water, wrapping her arms around her stomach and wondering why her new sensei wasn't handing her the towel so she could quickly dry off before trying again. In fact he was actually letting it drop to the ground from limp fingers.

Naruto's first real indication that something was wrong was when she felt the bikini briefs start to slide too easily down her legs.

"Oh god," Jiraiya finally spoke, "Oh god its horrible, but I can't look away."

Naruto looked down.

Oh.

At some point he'd stopped maintaining the Oiroke no Jutsu.

After that incident he was significantly more careful.

---

By evening time Naruto was exhausted enough that she was even willing to lean up against the old man for a little extra support as they walked. Strangely enough, he had yet to do any of the sorts of things she'd worried he might. In fact, ever since he'd insisted that she wear a dress that he'd pulled from somewhere instead of just using transformation to change into her usual clothes, he'd been strangely inoffensive. She was glad that he wasn't doing anything worse than keeping her steady with one hand on loosely on her shoulder, but it made her worry if anything was wrong with him. He didn't even seem to be leering at her. For such a big pervert that seemed really strange, but then maybe he was just waiting until they were at the bath house.

The lady at the kiosk seemed to know Jiraiya. It was remarkable how many people seemed to, and more remarkable still that for all his age and quite apparent perversion that so many of the girls seemed quite pleased to see him.

"Ahh hello Jiraiya. Nice to see you again," and then as her eyes switched to Naruto, "And who is this young Lady? Your daughter maybe?"

"Granddaughter is more likely." Naruto snorted, but the older two just ignored her.

"Ahaha, no," Jiraiya laughed unconvincingly, leaning forwards on the kiosk, his voice growing louder as his eyes found the neckline of the lady's top, "This is Naru, my new student."

"Oh really?" she asked, stealing a very pointed glance in Naruto's direction, "Is she a good student?"

"Oh very," Jiraiya replied easily, though with the way he was drooling Naruto wasn't sure if he actually knew what he was saying, "She's very enthusiastic, willing to learn, and can keep going a long time! Just the qualities I'm looking for a student. But my evenings are still free, in case you find yourself getting bored."

The women frowned a little more with each compliment that the sanin gave Naruto, and by the end of it Naruto could almost feel the glare on her skin. It was no wonder the old man kept getting slapped if this was how observant he was when talking to women.

"Well I suppose you'll be wanting towels for your baths," Jiraiya looked like a kid whose candy had been stolen when the lady turned away to grab towels for both of them, "Enjoy your baths."

Naruto sighed as she followed after the old man. She hoped the lady wasn't going to hold this against her. The one and only redeeming feature of having to spend the day in oiroke no jutsu had been that the angry glares from the town populace had been absent. Well now there was at least one woman who would be happy to glare at her again.

"Stop Naru-chan," the old man was holding her at arms length now, "Where do you think you are going?"

"To the baths?"

"Naru-chan, do girls normally go into the boys side of the baths? Well, unless... maybe you are _that_ sort of sexy babe, hmm Naru-chan?"

She coloured immediately, cheeks feeling incredibly hot at the suggestion. She hadn't meant to, she just hadn't thought about it. At all.

"I'm nothing like that, you stupid old pervert!"

"Well off you go then Naru-chan. Have fun." His leer, and the way he wiggled his eyebrows gave her a very good idea of what type of thing he was thinking, and she swallowed trying very hard not to think along similar lines.

---

The girls side wasn't as different as she had expected. The tiling was edged with a soft pink, instead of green, but apart from that differences seemed rather minor. The biggest difference Naruto was able to notice was the ominous feeling that she got every time she considered walking out of the doors of the changing room and into the actual baths. She'd never felt like that in the guy's baths. Well she couldn't stay here forever, and besides if she did she'd just end up seeing the people after they'd gotten out.

When she finally did step out she did her best to keep her back to the guys section of the baths – there was no telling if Jiraiya had a peeping hole here too or not – shuffling crab like along the edge of the pool. Naruto slipped down into the pool as quietly and stealthily as was possible in her current condition, taking a seat far enough from the other customers to avoid the chance of accidental body contact. Right now her best wasn't good enough; the woman to her right seemed to have noticed her.

"Are you alright, love?" Her voice was gentle and matronly.

Naruto nodded, doing her very best to keep her eyes trained on the water. Don│ft make eye contact, she told herself, and she might leave you alone. "Uh yeah, I'm fine. Better than fine really. Really, I'm great."

There was a long enough pause that Naruto thought that the lady had forgotten her, but alas it was not to be.

"Was it your first time dear?"

"What?" Naruto was confused enough that she actually looked up. For a second her eyes stayed on the woman's breasts, before springing up to her face.

"Well, you were walking a little strange. Don│ft worry, the soreness will disappear in a day or so."

Behind her Naruto could swear she heard the faintest traces of giggling.

"Uhh.." she still had no idea what they were on about. Was this some secret women's language or something? If she revealed she didn't understand would they know she was an impostor? "Uh, I'm just tired after sensei trained me all day."

"Oh really? Is that what young people call it nowadays?"

"Well yeah, I guess that│fs what we call it." Though what else they could call it eluded Naruto right now.

"I remember my first time," the woman on her other side commented, sighing, "He took me all the way up to Mount Horai, and we did it amongst the wildflowers. My dress was practically ruined by the pollen."

It was funny, Naruto noted as she inadvertently looked over at the woman, she didn't look much like a ninja. She wondered what she'd been training for.

By now however, she was absolutely certain that she could hear giggles.

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	2. Part two

Part Two

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The nightdress felt like a tent around Naruto when she woke up in the morning, and it was rubbing on her in a weird way. She was used to scratchy cotton boxers, not this light and silky smooth material that brushed against her distractingly.

Talking about scratching... she dropped her hand down between her legs to get rid of an itch, and stumbled into the bathroom. Loaded her toothbrush up, and lifted her face to look into the mirror.

He'd let the oiroke no jutsu slip sometime in the night.

Well that, combined with the fact that he'd just woken up, explained why it was rubbing distractingly down there. It actually felt sort of good, this sort of material against him, but it _looked _completely stupid.

He quickly transformed into a she, rapidly filling out the nightgown and changing from looking embarrassingly ridiculous into, well... into something that Jiraiya definitely would have approved of. Not her definitely not her. Hastily she rearranged the garment properly on her frame.

Boy, it must have been colder in here than she'd realized.

This was all stupid anyway. How the hell was she supposed to keep up the Oroike no Jutsu while she was asleep? She didn't really understand how she could be exected to focus on anything while her mind was busy dreaming, but the old man had been pretty adamant about it.

_"If you want to be a Super Pervert like me then you have to make everything training!"_

_"I don│ft want to be a pervert, you stupid old letch!"_

_"If you want to be a Great Ninja like me then you have to make everything training!"_

Sighing, Naruto finished brushing her teeth, and started going about the other tasks of getting ready for the morning. Really, she wasn't sure if she should be looking forward to the old man's training, or fearing his next dose of stupidity.

---

By late afternoon that day Naruto was actually able to walk on the water and only get the soles of her feet wet. She was sore, wet and tired, and moving to the centre of the stream where the water was moving faster still gave her trouble.

Only a couple of hours into the next day she had it down pat. It had actually been pretty easy. Maybe it had something to do with the fact that the orange bikini and sarong that she'd picked up made her feel much more confident and like herself, maybe it was the fact that the old letch had actually started offering useful hints and reminding her of them when she started to panic, or maybe it was just that he wasn't leering as much at her anymore... Well, she wasn't noticing it as much, at least.

This was her third day with the sanin, and already some of his antics were starting to seem normal. The way he watched her was uncomfortable, but she'd learnt to block out both his stares and the control that the oiroke required out of her conscious thought, and to focus solely on the task at hand.

"Congratulations Naru-chan!" the old man gushed as she easily stepped back onto dry land again, "I think you might be ready for the next step now."

Reverently the old man held out a bundle wrapped in fine rice paper to Naruto. What could it be, she wondered as she took it from him. A cool jutsu scroll? Something to let her summon great big toads the same way she'd seen the old man doing that first time at the baths? She tore the paper back in one excited moment to find...

Sandals. Stiletto heeled sandals with girly little straps all over them.

It wasn't quite the cool gift she'd been expecting, but when she lifted her eyes from the gift to her sensei's face his perverted grin dropped away immediately to be replaced by what she was coming to think of as his serious teaching expression. It was much better than his 'he's looking at my ass again' expression, and it was enough to stop her immediately assuming the worst of him.

"Why the hell do I need sandals?"

"You're going to be walking on the water now while wearing those."

"Huh? Why should I do that? I already learnt how to walk on water."

"Don│ft be foolish," Jiraiya said, leaning forward to bring an intense stare to bare upon Naruto, "With high heels far less of your feet are in contact with the water, so of course the control over you chakra has to be even greater. And besides," he added, not quite as an afterthought, "Wearing high heels will make your calves look fantastic!"

It was, it turned out, much harder to water-walk in heels. In fact, to start with she even had trouble walking on land without wobbling, and when she had sorted that out she found herself rapidly reacquainting herself with the idea of frequent and accidental baths.

Jiraiya had little sympathy for her.

"Not only do the heels force you to refine your control, but they will also help you develop your balance further. Ahahaha, Naru-chan, your sensei is brilliant!"

Naruto had her doubts about it. There were plenty of women out there who wore high heels, and that didn't seem to make any of them excellent ninja.

"Couldn't I just walk along fences or something?"

Still, walking on water in heels was difficult, and if the old perv was correct this might be a step towards defeating Neiji, and a step towards becoming Hokage.

---

The same ladies were in the bath house again that evening, for the third night in a row, and by now they were starting to treat Naruto in a way that made her almost feel like she was some strange sort of family member. Not that she really knew what family was like or anything anyway, but still. They were kind to her, seemed interested in what she was doing even if that was only so they had something to gossip about, and they treated her like she belonged. It was like putting on a dress and coming out this way just a handful of times had granted her entry into some sort of strange club. The Association of Female Familiarity, or something.

Well she could cope with being part of any strange club she supposed, as long as it didn│ft mean she was supposed to start crushing on Sasuke, writing stupid love letters, or going to the toilet in pairs. That would just be too creepy. Going to the toilet at all in girl form was quite creepy enough.

Her only real fear was that it wasn't actually a club at all, but instead a strange twilight world that she was stumbling into every night. That the people were really just malicious spirits, trying to trick her out of her soul, or into staying here for all eternity. If they ever offered her any food in here then Naruto would be certain to turn it down.

On the other hand it felt nice. It was good to have people who seemed to genuinely enjoy her company, instead of merely tolerating it, and they barely even knew her yet.

She was getting better at this whole bath house thing too, she felt. She was barely staring at their breasts at all anymore! It sort of felt good to know that she could teach her to look at the naked women _less_ even while she was hanging around a letch like Jiraiya all the time.

She was really grateful to be able to slip into the hot water today. Her legs ached from the tips of her toes all the way up. Her feet were the worst of course, but the steep angle of the heels had forced her to use allsorts of muscles in ways she wasn't accustomed to. Even her buttocks and her lower back were aching, though not as badly.

Her sigh of relief must have been louder than she thought, because the two ladies who she always sat with, Miyu and Haruka, looked over immediately.

"You look sore." Haruka, the younger of the two commented.

She nodded, taking her time to enjoying sensation of the very hot water before replying. "Yeah... My legs hurt all over..."

"Oh I see... I suppose your _sensei_ has been working you pretty hard then?"

"Uhh, yeah I guess he has," it was strange really, Naruto reflected, the way that Haruka and Miyu gave each other that strange look every time they said the word sensei, "He got me to do it all wearing heels today, and I've never worn them before."

She closed her eyes sinking down into the water until it was lapping at her chin. Beside her Miyu cleared her throat.

"Naru dear, do you really think it's alright for him to make you do all these things. I mean you are old enough now to decide how you dress for yourself, aren't you?"

"I guess," Nauto struggled for the words. It was pretty hard to think when the water was feeling this good around her, "But, uhh... He is my sensei, and he's just doing it because he's trying to train me to be better. Well mostly, at least."

It sounded like Haruka couldn't decide if she was giggling or choking. Miyu on the other hand snorted, like she didn't approve of training, or something. Well even if she really had been a proper girl, then Naruto still would have been a great ninja, so she didn't care what the other women thought. Still, she couldn't be mad, because the older lady was just trying to be nice to her really.

"Naru-chan, how old are you sweetheart? Seventeen? Eighteen?"

"Uhh... Yeah, I guess so." That was just a little bit older than she really was, but the idea of having to start trying to explain how she'd come to have a body older than her real age was a horrifying one. And besides, what if they started treating her like a kid when they found out she was younger?

"Well, I know you are old enough to decide for yourself now, but don│ft you think that maybe your sensei is just a little bit too old for you?"

"Uhh.. No, not really. I mean it's not like he's the sort of old geezer who's too tired to keep going long. Besides, if he was too much younger he wouldn't be as good at it."

"Oh, he must be really experienced!" said Haruka brightly, the mention of training always seemed to brighten her up a little, "Don│ft worry we understand. It can be really nice to have a talented _sensei_. Just be careful, okay?"

"If any thing goes wrong," Miyu added, her voice having lost its disapproving tone and gone back to being nothing more than soft and gentle, "Then you can talk to us about it. We'd be happy to help you out if ever need anything, or if he starts to give you any trouble."

She wasn't sure exactly why Miyo was so worried about her training, but the fact anyone was worried about her at all felt nice. She couldn't stop the traces of a blush from spreading across her cheeks. "Thank you 'baachan, neechan."

There was not much else but companionable quiet for a few minutes, until Haruka spoke up again

"You know Naru, I'm surprised it's just your legs that are sore."

"Huh? Why?"

"Well you never seem to have back pains, and well, with your figure... You must have really good support."

"Not really," Naruto confessed, confused once more to what it was these ladies were talking about, but comfortable enough in their presence to be open with them, "I'm an orphan, so there's not really anyone around to support me most of the time."

They both giggled at that, though their expressions were sympathetic, and Miyu reached out to hug her gently around the shoulders with one arm.

"Not that sort of support silly," Haruka told her, "Really Naru, you can be so innocent sometimes. I know, why don│ft we take you shopping sometime."

"My husband's away next week," Miyu added, "We could make a time, and then afterwards you can come over for dinner. Make a night of it."

It was nice to have someone offering to let her into their own home, Naruto supposed, but she still had no idea how they had got around to this. This weird secret girl language stuff was complicated. It would be nice, but she wasn't sure that it was a good idea. Besides, she only had three and a half weeks to train for the finals now. She was going to need every bit of time possible for training. She was going to have to turn them down.

"Okay... It sounds really nice."

She just knew she was going to regret this. But for now she just enjoyed the company and the warmth.

---

"Okay sensei. I think I've got it." She'd jogged from one bank to the other ten times in a row now without any sort of problems. Walking on water with heels had become almost instinctual, doing it without then was effortless. "So what's next?"

No doubt it would be something stupid.

"Now I want you to stand on the water, just near the bank facing me, and I want you jump up just a little."

Yup. It was stupid alright. She did it anyway, and found that her feet sunk below the surface of the water for a second, and suddenly the exercise made a little more sense.

"So still more control exercises sensei?"

"What?" Her sensei asked, sounding distracted, his eyes fixed intently upon something not quite at eye level, "What? Oh. You need complete freedom of movement in case you ever have to fight on water. Now just get back to bouncing. Uh jumping. I mean jumping."

One day, Naruto figured, she'd actually be grateful for listening to this stupid letch.

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	3. Part three

Part 3

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They still weren't done with done with water training, apparently. Control was good and all, she supposed, but she'd spent four days now with Jiraiya doing little more than basic movement on the surface of the water. She was itching to do something fun, something exciting, like learning a cool jutsu. Only Ebisu's words about how much of an advantage she could get from mastering the basics held her back from letting her grumbles escalate into a full tantrum. The idea of being able to outperform Sasuke in basic jutsu by the time he returned was tempting enough to let her whether the boredom for now. But still│c

"│cOf course it│fs important Naru-chan. You've largely mastered water-walking while consciously focussing. If you can master the art of doing it while thinking completely about something else then not only will it help you fight on the water, but also hold any chakra-forms you are using while being in the middle of combat. So to occupy your mind you are going to learn how to dance."

That sounded fairly reasonable she had to grudgingly admit to herself, there was also the chance that it might actually be quite useful.

"Okay," She said, her voice still laden with suspicion, "But why are you wearing swimmers too?"

Blood was already starting to trickle from the old man's nose as he relied to her. "Well, you are obviously going to need a dance partner, and you wouldn't want my clothes to get wet would you?"

That bit sounded considerably less reasonable.

In the end they decided he'd be fully dressed when he danced with her.

Even then she only wished that she could be wearing more than the bikini, but waterlogged clothes weren't much fun, and she was back to falling in a lot. The old letch was sporting a huge goofy grin as he held her and led her through the dance steps. He must have long ago learnt the art of dancing without thinking about it, because it was pretty obvious what _he_ was thinking about.

She improved of course, both in the dances, and in the frequency and level to which she slipped down into the water.

"Knowing these dances," Jiraiya told her in the middle of a routine, "could also be useful if you ever need to be a guard or infiltrate a high society function."

Every time she seemed to be have the basics of the dance under control Jiraiya would switch them to a new one, until finally her feet stopped slipping below the waterline even while performing completely unfamiliar steps.

She looked up from her feet to her sensei, saw him smiling right at her. She could almost feel a measure of pride emanating from him, for being able to do this even with all the distractions. She could almost feel│c She could almost feel│c

She could feel his hand on her ass.

She wasn't _that_ good at ignoring distractions

"You need to be able to hold your chakra forms through any distraction," Jiraiya told her when they were back on shore, trying but not quite succeeding in holding his serious face, "No matter how unexpected or unwanted that distraction might be."

After that it was a while before Jiraiya was able to do anything physical, and longer still before he was comfortable peeing.

The letch was _still _smiling though.

---

She checked her dress in the bathroom mirror one final time, making sure it wasn't booby trapped, or styled to cunningly be more revealing than it had appeared before she put it on. It seemed safe, but she wasn't sure she trusted it. It was one of the things that Jiraiya had given her, and his recent behaviour had proven that he was well and truly capable of stepping outside the bounds of acceptable levels of perversion.

Thinking of his recent behavior made her want to both wince and grin all at once. She didn't like what he'd done, or more like she didn't like that he'd done it. On the other hand if he hadn't acted up she wouldn't have injured him, and wouldn't have the rest of the afternoon off. On the balance of it all she decided to be happy.

Well, everything here seemed fine. The neckline of the pale blue dress was a little bit low for comfort, but the loose skirt was long enough to stop it seeming indecent. Time to try the receptionist.

"Hi there. I'm one of Hyuga Hinata's classmates, and I'm having trouble remembering where her room was..."

Piece of cake. Sickly sweet voice and her most innocent and confused expression and she let right through to the hospital wards. Would never have worked in her normal body, so she supposed Jiraiya some thanks for forcing her to stay like this the whole time; he wasn't going to get any though.

The door to her room was shut but not locked, so she let herself right in. Childhood had taught her that waiting around for an invitation got you no where.

"Hi Hinata!" she said dragging a chair over to the bed and summoning as much enthusiasm as she could, given the heavily bandaged state of the girl, "I got the afternoon off training so I thought I'd come on over." The other girl was lying there looking more than a little stunned, and Naruto winced internally remembering too late that the girl had never been the best at dealing with her outgoing nature. "I would have come by before now but I've been training really hard so I can kick your jerk of a cousin's ass during the finals. Don│ft worry I'll make him regret being such a jerk to you!"

For a while it seemed like Hinata might not reply at all, like she'd just keep shrinking back on herself, maybe retreat fully into a found seashell or something, but finally she found her voice. "Ahh│c ano│c umm│c wasn't Naruto going to fight Neiji-san?"

"That's right! I'm going to kick his ass!" Naruto nearly jumped out of her seat, already seeing Neiji on the ground at her feet grovelling for her and Hinata's forgiveness│c

Her triumphant pose might not have been so strained if it hadn't taken Hinata so long to reply again. "Ano│c but│c you're a girl│c" Hinata's head ducked down, and Naruto could just make out a mumbled "Sorry."

"Well yeah," Naruto admitted sheepishly, "But it wasn't my idea. Kakashi-sensei left to train Sasuke, so I had to find someone to help me train for the finals. Anyway, he's really strong and powerful, but he's a complete letch and he'll only train me if I stay like this all the time, and he keeps making me do all these weird things for him."

"Weird things?" Hinata said in something between a whisper and a gasp, "He makes you do weird things for him?"

"Yeah. But I think his training is really going to help me kick your cousins ass, so it'll all be worthwhile."

Hinata nodded jerkily, combined with how pale her skin was becoming now it made Naruto wonder if maybe she should call over a nurse or something. "Ano... do you like doing those things with him?"

"I guess you know. I mean he hasn't gotten me to do anything that's really fun for me yet, but mostly it's okay. Well, except for what he did to my ass. I didn't like that at all. The stupid pervert." Naruto looked up to find that Hinata had gone as still and silent as a statue. "Hey. Yo, Hinata? Are you okay there?"

She seemed to unfreeze a bit at a time. A hand then a leg then head... until she was fully a person again, not just an inanimate object. She looked slowly up to him and wet her lips. She was trembling like she was scared of something, even as she started to speak again. "Do you... I mean would you ever do something like that with someone else... Someone like... someone younger I mean?"

"I dunno. Ero-sensei is a total perv, but he is very talented and very experienced at that sort of thing."

Hinata sagged back down into the bed for a second, but then seemed to find her second wind. "Well maybe later... you would... with me..."

"Oh! Hinata..." Naruto couldn't believe that he hadn't thought of it earlier. Of course Hinata would want help training too. Of course she'd want to surpass her cousin so that he could never humiliate her like that again. She leaned forward and reached out to give the dark-haired girls hand a quick squeeze. Watched the way her lavender eyes traced the lines of her own face before dropping down below it. "Yeah of course you can. I'm sorry I didn│ft offer or anything. We'll do it after the Finals, when you're feeling better."

After that Naruto really did have to get the nurse. Hinata had passed out.

---

The kage bunshin had always been Naruto's signature move, and it had always been a hell of a lot easier for her than a lot of the other techniques, but this time it barely felt like he was flexing his mental muscles. She'd only created two of the clones, but even still, perhaps there really was something to the old man's garbage about refining her chakra control

"Okay, so why do I need the clones Ero-sensei? Planning on taking us all on at once?" Naruto cracked her knuckles, grinning at the prospect. In truth even a hundred clones probably wouldn't be enough to take on a man of Jiraiya's power, but after yesterday's stunt she'd welcome even the slimmest chance to pound him into ground again.

The old man just snorted however, not bothering to reply, but instead asking a question of his own. "Have you ever noticed that when a kage bunshin is destroyed that you know exactly how it happened?"

"Uh, I guess." Had he? Sure, he usually knew what had happened, but anyone would, right? You only had to watch the fight to know what was going on, didn't you?

"That's because when you dismiss a kage bunshin some of its memories are transferred directly to you. That is the techniques true brilliance. Today while you continue to work on mastering your control your bunshin are going to work on mastering some jutsu. When you dismiss them at the end of the day, anything they have learnt will be transferred to you, so you can master the jutsu without actually having to study them yourself."

"Okay," Naruto agreed, "But why can│ft I just learn the jutsu myself?"

"That's because," Jiraiya said, forming a quick hand seal and forming four clones of his own, "While they are studying with two of my clones, you are going to be too busy fighting me."

This time when Jiraiya grinned Naruto wasn't at all sure that he was thinking something ecchi.

---

The cries of not too distant battle were quite audible from the little forest glade, but the two kage bunshin who occupied it focussed their attention on each other.

"I'm not pulling my top off for you, you stupid letch!" The most female of the two almost growled.

"Not off," the older bunshin reassured her, "Just up a bit. Remember the seal that Ochimaru put on you in the forest, well put on the real you at least? Well we're going to need to do something about that. You might want to lie down for this too." he muttered, pulling a sealed vial of ink and a fine bristled brush from within his clothes.

"Huh, what?" Naruto added intelligently, reluctantly following the old perverts advice. It seemed a little odd that the man knew about what had happened in the forest of death without Naruto having told him, but then he was the second most powerful ninja in the village, Naruto supposed.

"The seal Ochimaru placed on you during the second test," the older bunshin said, dipping his brush to the ink and then starting to paint upon Naruto-bunshin's stomach, "It cuts you off from the Kyuubi's chakra, but it does more than that too. It also destabilises your own chakra control. To master jutsu without injuring yourself you are going to need that control, and unfortunately since you are only a bunshin you don│ft have the actual seal on you, so I can't just remove it. Luckily your brilliant sensei has developed a solution."

"Wait," Naruto found herself wondering aloud, "if you remove it then why don't you just remove the one on the real me?"

"It works by magnifying the flaws in your chakra control. If I remove it now then yes, control will be much easier for you, but if you continue to train with the seal as a handicap then you have the chance to iron away flaws that you might otherwise never even feel. So instead I've designed a seal of my own. Thirty seven different runes, a very complex and delicate matter, rebalancing your chakra, but if I do this right then you should be able to learn jutsu while the real you continues to work on your control. Almost done. Just wait a second." He pressed a single fingertip just above her belly button, muttered a single phrase and warmth briefly shot through Naruto's stomach as the seal activated.

She sat up, gingerly touching her stomach and finding the ink was now dry to the touch. It looked, well, complex. Asymmetrical too, like a number of beautiful characters dropped randomly on her stomach. All the seals she'd seen used so far looked a great deal prettier, better organised, designed instead of dumped. She wondered whether something like this could really be useful.

Well, there was only really one way to find out now, wasn't there?

"Hey, Ero-sensei, what jutsu 're ya teaching me first?"

---

She was a different sort of sore this evening. When she'd first started coming to these baths the hot water had helped relax her overworked muscles, but today's pains were from when her teacher had struck her, from when he'd thrown her to land hard upon the surface of the water. Thanks to the healing that being the jailor of the Kyuubi provided her with she didn't think any of the bruises were visible any more, but that didn't mean that she couldn't still feel them.

Training today had not only been tiring and difficult today, however, but also fun. Instead of just endless and trying tasks to improve her control she'd actually been fighting. Her teacher was better than her by a wide margin, and she'd been fighting not one of him but three, yet still it hadn't been too frustrating. It seemed that Jiraiya wasn't completely useless for everything after all; He seemed to have quite a good idea of exactly how much to hold back. He had pushed her hard, but not over whelmed her, nor left her feeling that her attacks were completely futile. His two clones had rarely attacked, moving in only when she lost sight of them, or forgot they were there. The purpose, he had explained to her, was purely to keep her more aware during battle; to stop her being surprised, and to help her react well even if she was.

She wasn't sure if it had worked, but it had been fun.

"You're wincing," Haruka commented, glancing over at her, "But smiling. Was he a bit rough today?"

"Not more than normal training is I guess, just it was a bit different today, is all."

"Oh really? I know that your sensei can be quite," Haruka paused for a moment, gently coughing, enthusiastic, "but I thought that was all it was. What exactly to you mean by _different_?"

"Haruka!" Miyu actually seemed a little upset, "you can't just ask her questions about things like that, especially in such a place. You'll embarrass the poor girl."

"Oh it doesn't matter," Naruto said. One day she'd have to ask Miyu what it was about training that she found so embarrassing. "I don't mind talking about it really. I mean its just training right. It's a pretty normal thing to do, right? Not like there aren't dozens of other people out there doing the same thing, so I don│ft mind talking about it."

Miyu suddenly sounded like she was choking, and Naruto turned to her worried. Haruka however didn't seem in the least bit worried, just leaning towards Naruto and gently pushing one of her elbows against her. "In that case spill. I want all the gory details."

"Well it wasn't gory or nothing weird like that, just, well... You know that Ninja's can create clones of themselves right? Well, sensei made two clones of himself, and they all trained me at once."

Miyu's voice was quiet, and sounded a little worried. Something like a cross between one of Sasuke's squealing fan-girls and a disapproving woman. "Oh Naru-chan, that sounds a little bit... dangerous."

"Or thrilling," Haruka interjected, "How was it? Good right?"

"Well," Naruto thought back over the afternoon, trying to ignore the jutsu parts not wanting to make things more complicated that necessary, "At first it was just really confusing. He kept coming at me from all these different directions and places, and yeah... But I got used to it after a while, worked out how to focus on all of them at the same time."

Haruka laughed aloud, "Sounds like you are developing some real talent girl! Girls as wild as you normally aren't so monogamous."

"Haruka..." Miyu cautioned again, but she sounded sort of breathless, and her shoulders were shaking.

"I guess not..." Naruto muttered, just wondering what the hell monogamous meant.

"Sometimes," Haruka said sighing, "I really wish my husband was a little bit more like your sensei."

Women really were a little strange.

------


	4. Part four

I am having a great deal of difficulty correcting formatting problems with this chapter. They do not exist in the edit mode or the live preview, but do on the actual archived copy. since I cannot wortk out how to remove these, I instead supply you with a link to a better formatted version on my homepage. Link in my account itself, since it also seems determined to thwart my efforts to put it here.

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Part four.  
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Morning again, light trickling in and making bright pools amongst the crinkled valleys and rises of his bed-sheets. The sheets were of the same shimmering satin material as her nightclothes now, and were new. New, like the fluffy pink pillows, the cushions in the shape of love hearts, the lava lamps, and the mirror mounted on the ceiling above the bed. He'd had to cover that last one up; it had been far too creepy waking up in the morning and seeing himself floating up there dressed in women's nightclothes. 

Really it was all a little creepy. Everything was so soft and gentle and feminine. He'd lived his life surviving with whatever he could get his hands on, and now to have such lavish and comfortable furnishings around was difficult to get used to. Every day it was like waking up in some strange twilight world where he was actually allowed to own nice things. He did wish more of it was done in masculine colours, like orange and black, but given that the old letch had first insisted on it and then paid for and fixed up everything himself, Naruto wasn't about to complain. It was nice to have a bed and furniture that was actually comfortable, and he figured that once he was finished training with Jiraiya he could just re-colour it himself. In the mean time he just hoped that no one he knew too well happened to see it.

How many days, he wondered? How long till the exam now? Neither memory nor cognitive functions were up to working yet, so he abandoned his search for the specifics. He was coming to both welcome and dread the end of the training now. As irritating as some of the old man's training methods were, and as irritating and perverted as the man himself could be, Naruto had to admit that he was getting results. His chakra control had improved to the point where jutsu he had once struggled with were easy, and now with the kage bunshin training he was learning new ones too. He couldn't wait to show off his improvement during the exam as he ground Neji to the dirt.

On the other hand though, he wondered what would happen when the exam was done. Was ero-senin going to want to see him ever again? Maybe once he'd lived up to Naruto's request to train him for the exams he'd want nothing to do with him anymore. Naruto was quite worried about that, though he wasn't always happy to admit it to himself. If the old man did go then he'd end up missing him.

He'd never had such personal training before; in the academy two teachers had taught a whole class-room of students, and Kakashi had never had a particularly hands on approach to the matter. When he trained with the old letch he actually felt like the man genuinely cared how his training went. Probably a large part of it was just the way he looked in his Oiroke no Jutsu body, but it felt like Jiraiya actually appreciated him. Even when the perv had seen his apartment and started yelling all that annoying crap about it being no fit place for a beautiful babe to live, even then it had been sort of nice too, to have someone caring about what happened to her.

Well lying here worrying about it wouldn't make the exam come any sooner or later, and besides, his bladder was starting to make urgent demands upon his attention.

He slipped out of the too comfortable bed and hurried towards the bathroom, feeling the delicate, brushing touch of his satin skirt against his legs as he went. The floor boards were too cold this early in the morning, but not so bad as the bathroom tiles. Briefly he wondered if there was someway he could get Jiraiya to pay for better heating too before lifting the toilet seat and slipping one hand down beneath his skirt.

He couldn't find it

Groping blindly, scrabbling to manage to wrap his hand about it. Only he can't its not there. It's completely gone. How the hell is he going to pee without his penis?

He stopped himself, and started to breathe slowly. Penises didn't just disappear, that wasn't the way the world worked. Slowly he lifted his hand up to his head, grabbed a bunch of hair in his hands and brought it forwards to his eyes.

Long. Too long, and far too silky too.

Suddenly she was having to try and actively remember to breathe again as she realised that she had actually done it. She had maintained her oiroke no jutsu through the entire night.

Emotions boiled within her. She wasn't sure whether she felt triumphant at her success or worried at how easy this was all becoming. She wasn't sure even which of those it was she wanted to feel.

In the end she delayed feeling either in favour of sitting on the toilet and not wetting herself.

---

"Why to I have to do all this dancing anyway?" Naruto grumbled, "I thought we were done with all the chakra control exercises."

These particular dances were ones for which she had no partner, and if the truth were to be told now that she was getting the hang of the movements and patterns she was actually starting to find the dance quite calming and relaxing. She wasn't sure how exactly this was supposed to help her against Neji though, and she had an uncomfortable suspicion that the perv was only having her do them so that he could watch. The dances were full of rolling, sensuous movements, which she had no doubt her sensei found very pleasing to the eye.

"Hmm what was that?" Jiraiya said from where he stood behind her, "Oh, sorry I was just distracted by something. You can't ever be finished with chakra control. There's always room for more improvement, and especially in your case, but that's not what this training is about."

"It's not?" Naruto wondered aloud, the steps of the dance turned her around and her back facing her sensei, whose gaze crept up from waist level.

"Of course not. If this was just for control I'd have you doing something more complicated too. We both know you are well and truly capable enough of dancing on water without difficulty. No, this training is for your taijutsu."

Naruto wasn't exactly sure how dancing was supposed to improve her taijutsu skills, and she tried to let him know that, but he just waved off her concerns.

"You commit to the attack far too soon and far too fully, Naruto. You leave yourself far too open to counter attacks. When you have to dodge you do it with your whole body and let it disrupt your own attacks. In this way, you let your opponents control the pace and movement of the combat. I need to teach you how to flow around attacks, and how to fluidly switch between attack and defence."

"And how is dancing supposed to do that?" Naruto asked doubtfully. Training with Jiraiya was a little bit like watching an action movie; suspension of disbelief was definitely required. Still, he managed to get results anyway. Somehow.

"Naru-chan, you need to start trusting your sensei's teaching methods," the letch said, his face twisting into a horrible rictus as he tried to affect a cute and offended look, "Your own style is sharp, percussive, and you telegraph your moves far too much. The dance style you are learning is far more fluid, each movement gracefully melting into the next one. It will help you, but the dance isn't the training, just the preparation. The real training is managing to keep dancing while I attack you!"

He lashed out at her, and Naruto barely managed to dart to the side.

"No. No No!" Jiraiya said, "You dodged. Don't dodge it. Dance around the blow instead. Start again, from the beginning."

She did. Again and again. Her sensei's attacks were few, but they came at different stages through the routine each time, and she never saw them coming in advance. And again and again he would hit her, or she would loose control of the dance.

"You messed up your foot work. Start again."

"You lost your timing. Start again."

"Your flow is broken. Again"

There were situations, she was discovering, in which her sensei could be deadly serious, and situations where dancing could be anything but calming.

---

This night the bruises were all gone by the time Naruto reached the bathhouse. Today the old man hadn't been hitting particularly hard or fast, and her body hadn't been pressed too hard, but that didn't change her need for relaxation tonight. The ninjutsu training with the kage bunshin was mentally exhausting as usual, but worse than that was the pure frustration that had come from the dance.

Jiraiya's attacks had been _slow_. She could have dodged anyone of them normally, but when she did she dropped out of the dance. It was maddening, seeing the blows coming at her so slowly, and yet being able to do so little to avoid them.

Still it was to be expected, she supposed. This time she wasn't just learning a move or a technique, she was trying to learn an entirely new methodology, and that was proving to be a whole lot more difficult. At this rate she was going to be spending at least another few days working on it, and even then it wouldn't be done. Jiraiya had already told her that as soon as she could dodge she had to learn to mix in attacks with the dance too.

Well, she supposed, at least her control had improved enough by now to stop her falling down into the water every time she made a mistake.

She dropped some coin on the Kiosk's counter, smiled at the woman there, and tried to ignore the fairly frosty look she got in return from the woman working there as she was handed her towels. It seemed that the old lady still hadn't completely forgiven her for the crime of being Jiraiya's student, which was funny because the woman seemed to really quite like the old man himself.

She stepped into the women's changing area, dropped her towels on the bench and reached behind her neck to untie the bow that held her silk sundress up. She tugged it loose, used one hand to hold the front of the dress at her breasts, and used the other to find the small zip at the back that would let it slip down off her hips. As she did this, she turned to smile at the girl who happened to be undressing beside her and…

…froze.

"Sakura..." Naruto heard the words leaving her own mouth, though she hadn't intended to speak at all. She had the terrible feeling that her smile had become more of a grimace. Shit. Shit. Shit. She was going to be killed.

"Uh hello. Do I know..." Sakura stopped, her green eyes growing large, her pink hair seeming to lift a little from her head of its own accord, "...Naruto?"

Naruto flinched. Oh god… She rigidly kept her eyes from dropping from Sakura's face, but even so she could tell that Sakura wasn't wearing anything more than a bra on her upper half. Oh shit. This was going to end up hurting, she was sure of it.

She opened her lips to try and speak, but the attempts died in her throat, and she really didn't know what to say anyway.

"Naruto... What the hell are you doing in here!"

"I... I... I... uh... well..." there was a good explanation, she knew there was, but it wasn't coming to his mind, "uh, to bath?"

She winced, knowing that was far from good enough. That truth was reflected in Sakura's eyes, which blazed in fury. Sakura reached forward with her left hand to roughly seize Naruto's upper arm, lifted her right arm up, ready to strike.

"You pervert, Naruto!"

The dress slipped out from beneath Naruto's now numb fingers, dropping fast, pooling around her waist for a moment before slipping past her hips too. Sakura's eyes darted downwards, and held there. Her strike faltered, ground to a halt too few inches from Naruto's face.

"...Naruto, what are you wearing?" Naruto wasn't sure how to read her expression now. The rage was muted, twisted into something weird that she didn't quite understand.

She followed Sakura's gaze downwards, to where the girl was staring at her breasts, and the lacy blue bra that matched the colour of her eyes.

"Uhh... a bra?" Naruto hazarded as a guess. It was pretty obvious what she was wearing though, and she doubted that pointing it out would ease Sakura's desire for righteous anger, so maybe an attempt to expand upon that a little was in order, "Uhh... it's not my idea or anything. Ero-sensei makes me do it. I wouldn't have done it at all if he didn't make me!"

His voice was starting to sound quite panicked, and he wasn't even sure what he was saying wasn't his fault anymore. Probably didn't matter, it was likely the letch's fault anyway.

Sakura seemed to have forgotten how to move. Her arm was still stopped in mid strike, hanging in mid air and reminding Naruto that her execution might have been not stayed but only delayed.

"Ero-sensei?" Sakura asked, her voice distant, numbed somehow, "Who?"

"Err," said Naruto, wondering at how strangely the conversation was changing. Wasn't Sakura going to hit her? "Well, you know how Kakashi left town? Well I had to get a different sensei, and he's sort of a pervert and he wanted me to err… do it, err... well, like this... And the bathing too and the dresses and that other stuff…"

"Do it like this..?" she repeated looking even more shocked now, like a big explosive note had gone off too close to her. "Do that other stuff… Oh Naruto… Why… why would you do that?"

There was something wrong with Sakura's voice. It had gone all weird and trembly. Naruto looked downwards, suddenly feeling ashamed. Was Sakura disgusted with her?

"Well... I really want to get more powerful, and I've got to beat that Neji guy. You saw how much of a bastard he was to Hinata. I guess it seemed worth it to me you know? I mean it's sort of bad, but he is a really powerful teacher and… and… Hinata just didn't deserve that, you know? She didn't deserve it at all." She swallowed, waiting judgement.

"You did it... for Hinata?"

"Well sort of," Naruto shrugged, "I mean its good how powerful I'm getting, but I wouldn't have started except for her. Um so yeah, I guess I did do it for her."

Suddenly Sakura was lunging towards her again, and Naruto flinched, closed her eyes in anticipation of pain.

The impact hurt far less than Naruto had anticipated. Sakura pressed up against her; collarbones and the tops of small breasts pressing up against Naruto's much larger ones. Slender arms slipped around her, squeezing in on her.

"Oh Naruto," she said wretchedly, "I'm so sorry Naruto."

Naruto could swear she felt water droplets splashing down on the exposed parts of her breasts.

"Um, it's okay I guess..." she said, wondering what the matter was. Did Sakura really think it was that bad to be a woman? Personally she didn't find it too much different from being a guy, except the way people treated you and looked at you. Mostly that was better when she was a girl really...

"Don't worry Naruto," Sakurta was squeezing her even tighter now, "It will all be alright. I'll be here for you whenever you need me. Every thing will be okay."

Yep, Naruto decided, women definitely had some weird secret code language.

---

It seemed to Sakura that Naruto was taking it all very calmly, considering what was going on in his... In _her_ life at the moment. Still, now she thought of it all through the academy Naruto had never really shown his hurts on the outside. She'd also had more than a week to get used to the idea...

Just the thought of having to get used to it made Sakura want to cry, or throw up.

God, to be able to do something like that, just because you had decided that the reward was worth it... There was something sick about that, and something noble too. It reminded her of Sasuke a little too, in a way that she couldn't really pin down.

_"Just don't you dare look at my breasts." _She had demanded before they had gone into the bath, and Naruto had readily agreed to it. She'd actually sounded proud as she'd told Sakura that she'd become great at not noticing other girls.

It seemed to be the truth too, because there she was chatting easily with two other fairly attractive older women, seemingly unaware of their naked bodies. She definitely didn't want Naruto staring at her, but it seemed somehow terribly sad that the training had done that to Naruto. Somewhere inside her the voice of that deeper, second mind was screaming words of white hot rage up at her, as it had been since she first realised what Naruto's teacher was doing to her. One day, it told her, when Naruto no longer needed her teacher, then she would make him pay. Even an idiot like Naruto hadn't deserved to loose the ability to enjoy the sight of another's naked body.

...and speaking of naked bodies…

In this setting it was all but impossible to notice Naruto's own. The transformation from boy to girl had added a few years to Naruto's body, and to her figure as well. It left her with a figure that was toned and slender from tip to toes, and a pair of breasts larger and more perfectly formed than Sakura thought that she would ever have. Naruto did have the advantage of being able to decide what she looked like, but even so it made Sakura feel self-conscious and jealous. With a body like that, maybe Sasuke would have noticed her by now...

She let her attention drift back to the other nearby women, the oldest of which was now speaking to Naruto.

"...more dancing with your Sensei then?"

Naruto's face looked so calm now that she was learning back in the hot water, even as she started to talk about the things her sensei had made her do.

"Uhh, not dancing with him, it was a bit different today. Different type of dancing, I think, and he was just standing there watching me while I did the dancing. Well, he watched until he came at me at least. Then I'd try to dodge it you know, but mostly he kept getting me. Stupid old letch."

_Came at me_...

Sakura blushed as she tried to banish the mental image of a female Naruto, her face wearing a shocked expression as it dripped from her nose and chin down onto her breasts.

She wondered if it would be alright to something like that, even for Sasuke. Somehow she doubted that she'd alright with even that.

------


	5. Part five

Part five

------

Jiraiya was easier than Naruto had suspected he would be. He just gave her this odd look when she talked to him about it, asking her a series of probing questions, but not seeming judgemental about it at all.

"You want to take the whole afternoon off training," he asked, "To go shopping with older women."

"Yes." Naruto replied, wondering if the older ninja was going to suddenly get angry at her, or if maybe he'd just be happy to get the day away from her.

"And then afterwards you are going back to one of their houses, to eat, and then to stay the night?" A weird note had entered into his voice now, something that if Naruto had been forced to guess on she would have said was closest to suspicion.

"That's what I just said..." Naruto grumbled, wondering if the old man was going senile, or deaf or something.

"And at this sleepover... do you think you'll all be lying around wearing lingerie, and maybe hitting each other with pillows and giggling?"

Senile probably, Naruto decided, not being able to think of any rational explaination as to why he might otherwise ask such a thing.

"Uhh, I suppose we could be." Naruto said, trying to keep the doubt off her face. After all, it was probably better to humour him, right?

His face smile lit up his face in an instant, and he leapt towards her, grasping both her hands in his.

"In that case I approve!" he was telling her. One of his hands disappeared for a moment, to return and press something into hers. It was a camera, she noted looking down, "Just don't forget to take pictures!"

---

Sakura had been more difficult. If she'd been angry with him for spending the night alone with two women then she would have understood it, but that wasn't it at all. She was still acting really weird.

Sakura kept giving her all these really odd looks, and kept turning to watch her like she might run away or explode when Sakura wasn't watching or something. When Sakura spoke she was talking really slowly and deliberately, as if she was a young kid who needed teaching by her pink haired friend. She supposed the concern was nice, only it was hard to get over how unsettling the rapid change was to actually enjoy it.

That didn't even cover the flashes of anger that she kept spotting in the pink-haired girl's features. They didn't seem to be directed at her, yet seemed to appear every time she opened her mouth, especially when she mentioned her training regime. Was Sakura angry that her own training wasn't progressing so fast? Well as long as she wasn't in trouble for it then she supposed she could just ignore it.

She turned her attention to what it was that Sakura was actually saying.

"...you know that if anything is making you the least bit uncomfortable then you don't have to do it."

"Sakura," Naruto reminded his team-mate, "I'm only going to be spending time with my friends. It's not anything really bad or anything. Besides, ero-sensei has made me do much weirder stuff with him and it was okay."

That flash of anger returned to Sakura as she spoke again, "You just shouldn't have to be a girl if you don't want to Naruto, it's just not fair."

"Ah but Sakura, they really think I'm a girl. They'd be pretty surprised if I turned up as a guy, they wouldn't know who I was or anything. And anyway, I'm getting pretty used to being a girl now. I can manage it for a while. Don't worry I won't do nothing perverted or anything."

That only seemed to make the other girl wince.

"Naruto," Sakura said, somewhat cautiously, "If you do feel anything perverted then maybe you shouldn't suppress it or anything. I mean it would be okay if you like looked at them a bit wouldn't it..."

It took a few seconds for Naruto's brain to start working again after hearing that. She wondered whether Sakura would hurt her if she tried to take her temperature.

"Well," she replied slowly, "Haruka probably wouldn't mind too much, 'cause she's pretty proud of her body, but I dunno... It wouldn't feel right Sakura, you know. They are my friends, and I'm not going to stare at them like I'm some sort of pervert or nothing. If I didn't know them then maybe I would, but they've been really kind to me, so it just wouldn't feel right. 'Sides, I'm going o be a girl anyway."

Sakura bit her lip, and shook her head like Naruto just didn't understand. Well, maybe she didn't, but Sakura certainly wasn't making matters any bloody easier on her.

"I understand Naruto," she said, though she didn't sound or look like she did really, "Just it's alright to be a boy you know. Just try to be a boy on the inside if you need to be. If you have any manly thoughts or ideas, then that's okay. You don't need to be ashamed just because you're a girl at the moment."

To Naruto, it sounded like the ramblings of a madwoman.

She couldn't do much more than nod her head and agree with Sakura, "Um okay then. I'll try do that."

There had to be some sort of rational reason as to why Sakura was all of a sudden telling her it was okay to look at girls when a few weeks ago it had been completely forbidden. She was almost tempted to ask Sakura if the other girl had developed a crush on her or something, but she was scared that would get her hit, and besides that didn't make much sense either. If Sakura had a crush on her then she'd hardly be wanting her to look at other girls, now would she.

But if not that, then what? The only other explanation she could think of was that a species of mutated, extraordinarily intelligent rats had eaten her brain, and were now controlling her body from the inside of her skull. That was perhaps more likely than Sakura spontaneously developing a crush on her, but it still seemed a little far fetched, and so she just put it as another item in the box of 'weird, unexplained girl things'. The box, had it of been real, would be getting pretty full by now.

"That's all I'm asking of you," Sakura was saying, "Just remember that it's okay to be whoever you are inside."

---

Clothes, Naruto was rapidly coming to decide, were best when she didn't have to think about them too much. She could handle a quick decision about what felt comfortable, or what would make her look distracting enough to make male opponents drop their guard, or what piece of clothing was the nicest colour (ie she could spot the orange one). If she was forced to she could even tell, with relative accuracy, what would suit her figure and complexion. However, some things were taking it too far. If you spent more than a minute and thirty seconds thinking about what you were going to wear then you were wasting time, as far as Naruto was concerned, but for today at least she could live with it. She hadn't come out today to buy clothes efficiently, she'd come out to spend time with her new friends. They seemed to think it was important to waste hours choosing the perfect outfits, and even if their company hadn't made that part bearable, then she would have put up with it to avoid letting her new friends down.

That part she could cope with. It was thinking about the _other _things that was really bothering her.

"Oh I bet your sensei would love to see you in this one!"

He probably would, but Naruto was doing her damnedest to avoid thinking about it. It was Haruka who was doing most of the damage. Miyu would fuss about her, and hold up dozens of dresses in front of her to see how they set off her eyes or whether the shape would look good on her, and Naruto could mostly ignore what was being said and done and focus purely on the fact that the much older woman was paying her a lot of attention. It was nice to know that Miyu cared that she looked good, even if Naruto herself wasn't particularly concerned about it.

With Haruka however it was a different story. She didn't seem to be capable of looking at more than two or three items without mentioning her old letch of a teacher.

_"What do you think he'd think of this one?"_

or

_"I bet he'd love to see you in this!"_

or

_"Oh, he'd definitely want to get up close and personal with you in this one!"_

Usually she was right too. The letch would love to see her try these things on, and that last one... she could just imagine him demanding they do grappling training if she wore it. She didn't want to think about it, but it was hard not to when Haruka was pretty much forcing her to answer.

"Uhh... yeah I guess he would," Naruto said, eying the too small and too thin piece of clothing Haruka was holding up in front of her.

"Well it's in your size, so why don't you try it on?"

Trying not to let the doubt show clearly on her face, Naruto took the garment and slipped back into the changing booth. She could probably make Haruka stop just by explaining that she didn't particularly want to look good for Jiraiya, but she didn't want to make the older girl worry about her. Sakura kept asking her all these really weird questions about the old letch, acting like she should be upset about all the training he was making her do. Really, Naruto didn't think that being a girl was all _that _bad, and was sort of surprised that Sakura did. Maybe she had secretly always – in her deepest hear of hearts - wanted to be a boy. That would explain why she was after Sasuke all the time, because, as much as Naruto'd come to like the guy, she still thought he was pretty girly looking.

Anyway, the important thing was that Sakura was acting really strange about her sensei, and she didn't want her other friends to start worrying about him too. It was enough of a pain just having to deal with the old letch without having to justify the decision to everybody as well.

She looked down at herself as she finished pulling on the dress.

The things that Miyu was picking out for Naruto to try on tended to be a little too formal and feminine, but regardless of any other flaws they might have they were always both elegant, and tasteful. You could hardly say the same for Haruka's choices.

Haruka's picks ran the gamut from exceedingly casual to really quite formal, but every single one of them did its best to flaunt her body. She wondered if it had anything to do with Haruka's own teacher. Maybe she'd been taught by an even bigger letch than Naruto's own sensei. She'd have to have been, if she really thought that dressing up like this for him was important.

This particular dress was made from a lilac fabric that shimmered to shades of pink, red and blue when it caught the light. Small and delicate were terms that described it adequately, but only if you were in a particularly forgiving mood, which Naruto decided she probably wasn't any more. The skirt was slit up one side, and short enough to show off a lot of her thighs. The body covered just enough of her front to avoid being completely scandalous, but the back, sides shoulders ere nothing more than an intricate lattice of slender, criss-crossing straps that showed far more than they hid. Flowing sleeves stretched from her wrists up to halfway between her elbows and shoulders.

The straps made it tricky to get the damn thing on; it was hard to know what was supposed to go where at first glance, and even once she'd worked that out the execution wasn't entirely simple. Finally though she pulled the last bit into position, finished sliding into it, and turned around to take a look at herself in the mirror.

She had to struggle not to gasp aloud.

The sight made her rather glad that she didn't have a penis right now. Even so though, it was relatively breathtaking. She really had to work out a way to stop Haruka dressing her, she realised, otherwise she might end up loving herself as much as Sasuke loved himself.

Now that really would be a shame.

"Mmm, I like it," Haruka's voice was a little throaty as Naruto stepped out of the change room and did the slow twirl that the women seemed to think was necessary, "What do you think?"

It was pretty sort of, Naruto couldn't deny that, and the thought of seeing someone else wearing it was a pleasant enough thought that she could feel her cheeks heating. Haruka's bold grin confirmed that her blush was well and truly obvious. Still the idea of actually wearing it where people like the old letch could see her made her quite nervous.

"I don't know Haruka..." Naruto said, searching quickly for a slightly honest reason to reject it, "it's pretty difficult to get in and out of."

"That's the beauty of it," Haruka said, leaning in close and speaking under her breath, "It's fairly forgiving in the wash, and the skirt is short enough that if you are really in a hurry that you won't _need_ to take it off."

Naruto wondered if Haruka's exaggerated wink was actually supposed to make her even more confused.

---

Miyu's house was big, much bigger than she'd expected. Certainly there were bigger, but compared to her own cramped apartment it might as well have been mansion.

"My husband is away on business," Miyu explained as Naruto stood gawping at the expansive living area, "and he's taken the boys with him. Trust me, it feels a lot busier and fuller around here when the boys are home. It doesn't take many men to make the place feel very cramped, and there's always something needing tidying up when they're around."

Taking a look around Naruto wondered if she was right. Her own place tended to be a lot messier than this house, which was almost radiating of beams of tidiness. Was that something that girls were taught; how to be neat?

"Still," Miyu continued, "It's seemed a little quiet ever since my daughter got married and moved out. The house always seems just a little bit too big since then, and its worse when the men aren't around, so it's lucky that you girls agreed to come over."

Naruto watched as Haruka gently touched the older woman and brought into a quick hug. She wondered if that was the sort of thing she should be doing too. Part of her was convinced that if she tried anything at all similar that she'd only end up getting hit for it. Sakura always used to hit her for anything like that, and sometimes just for smiling the wrong way.

Come to think of it though, even Sakura was acting differently these days. Now Sakura hadn't only stopped hitting her for the odd accidental touch or anything, she was actually dragging her into hugs too, often at the strangest of moments. Her eyes tended to get all misty when she did it, or angry looking sometimes. It couldn't be just because Naruto was a girl now, because Sakura knew that it was still her on the inside.

Maybe, Naruto had been starting to wonder, Sakura really did want to be a boy on the inside, and she found Naruto attractive as a girl. The very thought probably should of made her feel happy, but instead it was just weird and confusing. She didn't want anyone to like her just because she looked cute as a girl, not even Sakura. Besides, she wasn't even sure that was what it was. She really wanted help with it all, but she didn't know who she could ask about it without ending up just getting in any trouble. Even if Sakura really was feeling that sort of thing, Naruto doubted she'd like it if she started telling other people her theories and thoughts.

"Do you want any help with the cooking?" Haruka was asking now, following after Miyu as she headed off to the kitchen.

Naruto moved to join them, propping herself up on her elbows and watching them across the top of the counter that separated the kitchen from the living area. She could recognize some of the ingredients that the two older girls were pulling out from the cupboards, but a surprisingly large number of them – mostly the herbs and sauces – were completely unknown to her.

The things they were saying now were fairly confusing to Naruto too, and she wondered if this was more weird girl talk stuff, or if there were guys out there who could understand all this cooking jargon stuff too. Certainly no one had ever taken the time to explain any of it to her.

"Naru-chan," Miyu addressed her, wearing her protective face again, "Are you okay dear?"

Naruto shook her head, trying to brush the question away with a few flaps of her hands.

"It's nothing bad. I'm just a bit confused about what you guys are talking about."

"Confused?" Now it was Miyu who looked puzzled, "Confused about what?"

"Uh, all that cooking stuff," Naruto replied, "I don't really understand any of that sort of stuff. Normally I just eat cup ramen when I'm at home."

"You can't just eat ramen," Miyu said, looking as horrified as if Naruto had just admitted to eating babies, instead of just cup ramen, "and you really should know how to cook by now anyway."

"I should?" Naruto asked, wondering why no one had told her that. Probably because she was really a guy she supposed.

"Of course," Miyu assured her, "What if you get married? Do you expect your husband and children to live off cup Ramen too? Every woman, especially every wife, needs to know how to cook a good meal."

"Really?" Naruto asked. She hadn't ever really thought particularly about where it was that other people's bento's had come from, but he hadn't particularly associated them with wives or mothers, "I thought Women did other things mostly. Like take care of the children, and you know, look after their husband and stuff." Unless they were a ninja of course, then they'd have to get someone else to look after the children she supposed.

"Oh Naru…" Miyu said, sighing, but smiling warmly at her too, "You know that not everything in a marriage is about taking care of your husband in the bedroom…"

"Well, ahh you got to look after them other places too, right?"

That seemed like a pretty reasonable thing to say to Naruto, but it made Haruka laugh and Miyu colour.

"Only adventurous youngsters like you do that sort of thing all over the house dear… Us older ladies barely have enough energy for doing it just in the bedroom."

That seemed a little strange to Naruto, shouldn't you be helping someone no matter where they were if you really loved them? Still, Miyu did have a lot more experience than her, so she supposed that she must know what she was talking about.

"Um okay then…"

Haruka laughed again and reached over the bench to squeeze softly on Naruto's hand.

"Don't worry Naru, Miyu's a little bit traditional. Still, you really should know how to cook anyway. You can never be sure when it might prove to be useful."

"I suppose so..." Naruto reluctantly and uncertainly agreed. The three minutes that Ramen took to cook was already longer than Naruto preferred to wait, it hardly seemed like she'd manage to be patient enough to take the time to fully cook a meal every evening.

"Come on around here," Haruka said, beckoning to her, "You can start by learning how to cut the vegetables."

And so, with the other women taking turns to lay their hands over hers to show her the correct actions, Naruto started to learn how to cook.

---

By reapplying her jutsu Naruto could cause her hair to instantly transform back to a perfectly styled condition, yet now she was discovering that there was a certain pleasure in letting someone else brush it out for her. The gentle tug of a brush on her hair as she sat between Miyu's legs was oddly comforting and relaxing. Naruto could almost imagine that the brush was pulling all the droplets of tension out of her, collecting it as a ball of shed hair nestled amongst the base of the bristles.

_"I used to do this for my daughter."_ Miyu had said when she started, and maybe that was part of what made it feel so comfortable. Miyu was acting almost like a mother to her tonight, which was making her feel not only comfortable, but also almost cherished.

Haruka on the other hand wasn't the least bit motherly. She was far too teasing, far too lively, but that life also was a comfort to Naruto. It actually reminded her of herself, though no where near as bad as she could get at her most boisterous. That thing alone didn't cover more than a small fraction of Haruka's personality, but coupled with her friendliness it was by far enough to put Naruto completely at ease in the girls presence. Except for, of course, when she was doing something embarrassing.

Speaking of which...

A bright flash momentarily blinded Naruto, even though her eyes were half closed; it must have got Miyu too, because the brushing stopped for a couple of moments. Blinking rapidly to clear her vision, Naruto looked up to find Haruka ws playing with the camera Jiraiya had given her earlier.

"Now, now," Haruka said, smirking and shaking a finger at Naruto, "Turn that frown upside down missy. I know that your _sensei_ has probably seen in your nightclothes often enough Naru, but trust me, he'll love this shot anyway. You looked so cute and peaceful sitting there with your hair down like that. Trust me its going to be a masterpiece."

Naruto sighed and stuck her tongue out at the older girl, provoking another short laugh. It was no use complaining too much, because Haruka was well meaning enough not to be doing anything too horrible but also mischievous enough to enjoy the complaints anyway.

She supposed it wouldn't hurt overly much if Jiraiya ended up with a picture of her in one of the pieces of lacy night-ware he kept giving her; after all the letch had spent days watching her train in bikini's by now, and they covered significantly less. Still, it did make Naruto wonder if she should take revenge by making sure that the old letch ended up with a picture of Haruka on his camera too. The older girl was actually wearing something surprisingly similar to Naruto, and she had no doubt that he'd enjoy it immensely. The one problem with that idea though was that doing something like that would probably offend Miyu's sensibilities far more than Haruka herself.

Besides, the old letch really didn't deserve something that nice.

"Well now, we'll just ignore that little pest, won't we Naru-chan?" Miyu was said haughtily, separating Naruto's hair into three parts, and carefully twisting it into a tight braid, "There. All done now, and I'm starting to feel quite tired. I think it might be time for me to sink beneath my bed-sheets."

"Hmm but surely you could wait up for just one more story Miyu? We've all got plenty left to tell I'm sure."

"I've had plenty enough of your sort of stories for one night Haruka," Miyu returned,  
"You can continue to rob us of our innocence in the morning, don't you think?"

"Innocence?" Haruka asked, affecting a startled look, "I didn't think either of you had any of that left. Which reminds me, we haven't heard all that much from Naru at all tonight, and I'm sure she has a lot more juicy stories that she could share with us."

"I'm sure she does, but personally I can manage without the gory details, at least at this time of the night."

Naruto was quite glad that Miyu was against gory details, because the only story she had that really involved gore was the story of the mission which had resulted in her first kill. After such a pleasant evening she could do without having to dwell on that incident at all.

"Well if you are going to be such a prude," Haruka said winking, "then I suppose I could cope with a little beauty sleep myself too."

Miyu showed the Haruka and herself to a spare bedroom with two made beds, and gave them both a hug before she headed off towards her own room.

It was funny, she realised as she slipped beneath the fluffy covers of one of the beds, how different it felt knowing that there was an entire large house out past the door of the room instead of just a cramped living area and kitchenette. It was mre than odd really, it was almost unsettling.

A yawn from beside her distracted Naruto from her thoughts, and raised her spirits a little too. That was another thing that she wasn't used to, having another person so close to her as she settled down for sleep.

"It's sort of weird," she murmured aloud, "having someone else in the same room."

"Mmm hmm," Haruka replied, yawning sleepily again, "I know what you mean. It can be pretty strange when your partner isn't here with you, can't it? Especially when you are young and have all that energy for other related activities too."

"No it's not that..."

Naruto wasn't sure how to say it. She didn't have a partner, and had thought that Haruka knew that, but that didn't seem important right now. She couldn't work out how to tell the older girl that she'd never felt closer to being an accepted part of a family. She was lying, ready for sleep within arms-reach of another person who treated her with kindness.

She couldn't shake the thought that maybe, just maybe this would be what it was like to have an older sister. Was this what they were like? Did they listen to you, care for you, buy you things and tease you about all sorts of weird things?

She turned to try and ask, but found it was too late. Haruka was already asleep.

Tomorrow. Maybe she'd ask about it tomorrow.

And then she too slept.

------


	6. Part six

Part Six

------

Something about her old sensei had made Naruto think that his hands would be lukewarm at best, but against her bare skin now they felt like they were hot enough to burn her. It could have been comforting if they were just resting against her, but the way he was moving them banished all thoughts of comfort from her mind. She gasped as her sensei's fingers passed over a particularly sensitive spot. His fingers were slowly and methodically moving up and down the expanse of her bare skin, managing to make her feel so much better than she would have thought he could.

It was surprising, finding out that he could make her feel so good like this, and she wasn't sure whether that was going to make him seem more or less creepy to be around while she was a woman. It helped explained why some of the women just kept coming back to him though, if he could manage to make them feel like this.

Some small part of her was very aware that they were technically in a public area, that at any moment someone else might come in to see her lying topless with her perverted old sensei stooped over her. If anyone did she knew she'd be embarrassed beyond belief, well and truly mortified, but she couldn't manage to make herself hold onto the worry. What he was doing to her felt too good.

She didn't mean to, but Naruto let out a drawn out groan. It was so hard to keep the sensations bottled up inside. Feeling embarrassed and imagining the way that the pervert was probably grinning at her after hearing that she grasped firmly at the fabric beneath her.

If she'd been a guy and had a girl he knew making those noises he'd have been embarrassed, but she knew exactly how much lecherous sensei would enjoy hearing it. He seemed to like doing this to her even more when she herself seemed to be liking it. Probably he just enjoyed the victory over her determination to take the entire act as just another training exercise. He kept telling her how much easier it would make infiltration missions as a woman if she could easily do this, but part of her was sure that he just liked trying to make a pretty girl gasp and moan.

"Naru-chan, what did I tell you about grabbing the towel?" her sensei asked, his words sounding more like a gentle reprimand than an actual question, "You are tensing up, and this isn't going to feel any good if you do that. It might even end up hurting you."

She released her hands from their clutch on the towel and did her best to relax again. Sensei was right in some ways, because being tense wouldn't help her at all, but neither did she really want to be relaxed. It was harder to control herself when she was too relaxed.

"Okay," Jiraiya said again, this time not talking directly to her but to her clones that were standing around her prostrate body, "Lets get started again. These muscles of the shoulder here can directly effect the movement of the neck..."

He started again, working the muscles around her shoulders, massaging slowly at fisrst to give her clones a chance to absorb the motions. It didn't matter that he was starting slowly, Naruto immediately lost the ability to focus on what he was actually saying. She supposed it didn't matter that much, because when she dismissed the watching clones then everything they'd learnt - the massage techniques, the knowledge of muscle groupings and the pressure points around them - would be instantly transferred to her anyway. Still, she'd feel less stupid about the whole exercise if the old mans touches didn't fell so damned good.

There was a pause in the action, and then the hands that were rubbing her were replaced with much more slender ones. It was the turn of one of her clones, now, and would continue to be until Jiraiya thought that she had got the movements down perfectly. The saddest part of it all was how much nicer the stupid old man could still make her feel. She supposed that meant that she would end up spending several more days doing this. It was more pleasurable than sparring she supposed, and it wasn't stopping still more of her clones from practicing jutsu.

Still, it was embarrassing, and unlike fighting it didn't make the day seem to pass any faster.

Jutsu, jutsu, jutsu, and constant sparring, that seemed to be pretty much all she did these days. She spent everyday learning things that would have salivate not that long ago, and thanks to her improved charka control she was managing to pick them up pretty fast. Jiraiya was teaching her, or at least was teaching her clones whose memories she got anyway, some of the coolest things she'd ever seen. She should have been glad for that, or glad from the break of it, or something. Instead, all she wanted was for nightfall to come so that she could see if Miyu and Haruka were at the baths, so that she could sit quietly with them.

She'd used to hate quiet times, and had avoided them like the plague, yet somehow they were now her favourite part of the day. Almost, at least. If she was truly honest with herself she had to admit that when at the end of each day Jiraiya put his hand on her head, tousled her hair and told her she'd done well were even nicer. It was nice to know that he was proud of how well she was doing, even if he was an immense pain in the arse, and a huge letch.

She didn't want to think about what Haruka was going to say when she tried to tell her that shed spent a large part of the afternoon being massaged by her sensei. Probably it would be something weird and confusing. In any case Naruto knew that Haruka would grin at her in that weird way and make suggestive sort of motions with her hands. Naruto was coming to think that Haruka's training must have been even weirder than the stuff that Jiraiya was making her do.

Still, whatever Haruka might say and no matter how weird it might be, it was still always great to catch up with them.

"Alright Naru-chan, we're done for today."

She waited for one of her clones to re-tie her bikini behind her back before rolling over and sitting up, letting her legs swing over the edge of the table. What idiot other than her perv of a teacher would think dragging a professional massage table out into the middle of the forest was a good idea?

"Hey, Ero-sensei," Naruto said noticing the position of the sun in the sky, "Why are we finishing so early?"

That question had the letch grinning at her.

"There's a festival on tonight. We'll be doing a bit of sight-seeing, and a bit more training too. You are going to need a new kimono."

He looked triumphant as he spoke, and Naruto wondered whether her heart was supposed to be soaring or plummeting, because currently it seemed to be trying to do both.

---

"Your recovery is still coming along very well Hinata," The doctor said, scribbling something down in her notes as she spoke, "If you are still eager to get out of the hospital then there should be no problem in releasing you later this afternoon. I'll warn you though, you are still going to have to take it very easy, and without the aid of medic-nin, your recovery may be a little slower, okay?"

Hinata mumbled her acceptance and watched gratefully as the doctor turned to leave.

She probably was being too impatient, she realised that. Nobody seemed to think that it was a good idea for her to release herself from the hospital yet, which only made her glad that they weren't aware of what else it was that she'd been doing in the last week. She was supposed to be taking it easy and just resting, but she didn't have the luxury of taking her recovery so casually.

With so many of the things in her life it all came back to Naruto-kun.

It had been just over a week now since the blonde had come to visit her, and since that time Hinata's thoughts had barely left him, or her, as she currently was. Hinata had been surprised at first to see Naruto walking around as an older looking girl, and then shocked and horrified when she had found out why he was a girl, and what else she was having to do to get training from her new sensei.

To go to such lengths, poor Naruto-kun...

Naruto-kun... Given the fact that Naruto was living as a girl right now, then perhaps Naruto-chan would be more appropriate. Just the thought of being bold enough to use chan in conjunction with Naruto's name was enough to make her blush, but it would be alright if he was still a girl at the time, and besides, if they really slept together...

That was what this was all about really. Somewhere amidst her shock and horror at the thought that Naruto-chan must be using sex to secure training with her new sensei, Hinata had found the courage to ask if Naruto would do the same sort of thing with her too, and amazingly enough, she had actually agreed to it.

It was a miracle that she had found the courage to ask, and a miracle that Naruto had accepted. With such good fortune favouring her she wasn't prepared to take any unnecessary risks. She had to get out of hospital and take Naruto up on the agreement before the unthinkable happened and Naruto changed her mind about it. She had to grab onto this wonderful and magical opportunity before it slipped completely away from her, because she doubted that she would ever find the courage to ask Naruto such a bold thing again.

That was why she had been ignoring the doctor's advice. That was why she had used her Byakugan ability to watch the way the medics formed their charka, and had been trying to emulate their work on her own damaged charka system. It was difficult work, and was quite dangerous, considering that the damage was to the very same system that she had to try and use to repair herself. The doctors had warned her that using her charka could cause very serious problems if she wasn't exceedingly careful, yet she had still somehow managed to make it work for her without causing too many problems, and now she might have the chance to grab hold of this opportunity before it slipped away forever.

Having become used to doing some healing on herself each day, Hinata was actually having to restrain herself from continuing today. Tonight, if what Natsume had reported to her was correct, she was going to need every bit of strength that she could muster.

As if summoned by Hinata's thoughts there was a quick rapping on the door to the room before Natsume pulled open the door and strode inside.

"I brought the tailor, Hinata-sama." Her voice was polite and respectful, but her stern expression conveyed well enough how strongly she disapproved of the tasks that Hinata had been making her perform on her behalf.

It was amazing that she'd ever managed to convince the older girl to go along with her directives in the first place, she would never have managed to convince Neji to do these things for her if he had still been the ninja assigned to look after her. Luckily in this case, no one seemed to think that Neji was an appropriate guardian for her after the things he had said to her during the preliminary matches of the chunin exams. Of course, they probably wouldn't have been any more happy with Natsume's actions. Spying on Naruto probably wasn't what they had in mind for the older ninja.

Even so, Natusme hadn't been willing to spend too much time away from Hinata, but that hadn't turned out to be too much of a problem anyway, because apparently Natsume had arrived that afternoon just in time to see Naruto redressing and sitting up from some strange-looking, raised bed thing, as her sensei stood close by talking to her about the evenings activities.

Whatever Naruto had been doing with the old man, apparently there had been some of her clones watching it going on. Hinata wondered if that meant that Naruto was a voyeur, or maybe worse yet, some strange sort of exhibitionist. That thought made it hard to breathe as an odd mixture of worry and excitement crowded in on her. Well, if she was very lucky, perhaps she could find out about Naruto's various kinks as early as tonight.

Tonight, according to Natsume's retelling of her surveillance, Naruto had been ordered by her sensei to attend the festival, and Hinata intended to be there to meet up with her.

That was why she needed the Tailor. When she just happened to bump into Naruto-chan she was going to make sure she was wearing a particularly exquisite Kimono.

"Hinata-sama," Natsume said, squaring off her shoulders, and Hinata knew what was coming next. She'd already heard this short spiel half a dozen times this morning, "I do not think that Hiashi-sama would approve of you going to the festival this evening, given the recent state of your health."

The stern look from the older woman was enough to make Hinata want to shrivel up, but she managed to remain more or less composed for the same reason that she had remained strong so far; Naruto-chan was going to be at that festival, and she had already agreed to sleep with her.

"Ano... I think... that I will go anyway... and if Father finds out then I will say it was my fault..."

Natsume frowned at the words, but there was a spark of respect behind the irritation too. Was this what was required to gain respect, to trample over the worries of others? The thought made her feel ill. Was this what her father had always wanted her to do; to cause annoyance and convenience to everyone around her, all in the name of getting respect and her own way? Only the thought of seeing Naruto tonight stopped her from crumbling at that thought and apologising. Even as it was she had to bite the inside of her mouth until Natsume had left her alone with the Tailor.

"So, young mistress," the white haired old tailor addressed her, "You are looking for a new and beautiful Kimono for the festival tonight, am I correct?"

She wasn't yet sure how to tell him what she wanted, so she ended up just nodding to the question.

The measuring came first of course. She always found this part of the fitting process overly invasive and uncomfortable. the process made her extremely glad that she'd thought to slip on her bra beneath the hospital gown earlier that morning, and wish that her tailor was a woman instead of some wrinkled old man. Still, he was supposed to be amongst the very best, so perhaps it would all be worth it. She really wanted to be able to stand out tonight.

"Now, in terms of styling," the Tailor continued, "Do you have any particular elements that you would like me to keep in mind for the finished kimono?"

Hinata shook her head.

"No, um not anything in particular, but... ano... I would like something to, um... show off my, um, body flatteringly." She could feel her cheeks heating with her words, wondered if they would make the much older man think any more poorly of her.

The Tailor smiled reassuringly at her and nodded as if he were in complete agreement.

"Of course my dear, you needn't have any worry. I've been at this trade my entire life. I know how to choose the shaping and styling that will compliment your figure best."

That hadn't been what Hinata had meant. That wasn't even close. She'd seen the way that Naruto had dressed when she had visited her, her clothes effortlessly showing vast expanses of her creamy skin in the most delightful way imaginable. Her neckline had plunged down very low, and when she had leant towards her Hinata had been able to see right down her cleavage, and had seen a lot of flesh, and more than a little of the other 'girl's' lacy bra. It had been one of the most wonderful things that Hinata had ever seen. She'd never really found another girl particularly attractive before, but then the breasts of Naruto's girl form were very pretty, and more importantly, they were very [iNaruto[/i.

Maybe Naruto thought that was how pretty girls dressed. Maybe he would want to see her cleavage. What if Naruto didn't find her interesting if she turned up modestly covering her chest? She couldn't afford to risk something like that happening, so had to make sure that the Tailor made her something that was not only pretty, but also sexy. Only... she didn't know if she could ask him. It had been hard enough to say it the first time, when he had been waiting on her answer, and she had been phrasing it relatively vaguely. How could she possibly say it now, in the middle of what he was saying? He didn't even seem to think that the sort of kimono she was thinking of was a possibility.

The Tailor continued on, uninterrupted.

"It will be ade of the finest siks of course, nothing less would do for a Hyuuga, I am sure. As for colours, well now... A lilac base of course, to match your eyes, and I think we will support that wish touches of pink, white and gold. I have a lilac fabric with pink and white sakura petals, I believe, and If i combine that with..."

Finally it was too much.

"Breasts!" Hinata managed to squeak out, far louder and far less articulately than she had originally intended.

"I beg pardon?" The tailor looked worse than shocked. At least the surprise kept him for seeming scandalised just yet.

"My... my breasts," Hinata managed, "I mean, ano..." but she couldn't quite manage to get any further than that.

Hinata couldn't help but notice that the Tailor was looking at them, now that she had drawn his attention to the subject not once but twice.

"For a girl your age they are more than generously proportioned, I am sure, but I fail to see what that has do to with our fitting." He didn't seem to be able to decide if he wanted to sound disapproving or excited.

"I mean, um... that I, ano... need..." Hinata stopped, closed her eyes and tool a deep breath. She could do this, for Naruto. What did it matte if the man was staring at her chest? Maybe by tonight Naruto would be too, so surely she could ignore it and just get this difficult sentence out of the way, "I.. I need it to show my breasts. Um... I mean, ano... cleavage. I need it to show some cleavage. Please."

The Tailor swallowed slowly.

"I have a reputation and a standard to maintain." he said, but his voice was lacking some of its earlier rigour.

"Ano, but... It's very important to me."

Relief washed through Hinata when she realised that the Tailor was slowly nodding his head again.

"Cleavage..." he muttered.

---

"Right!" Jiraiya barked out.

Naruto tried to redirect her hammer in mid-swing, to bring it down on one of the targets to the right of the board, but misjudged. Instead of hitting one of the green painted kappa models that were popping up and down out of the box she hit nothing more impressive than the surface of the box in which they hid.

She hadn't exactly been counting, but she rather suspected that this was her four thousand and eighty third miss. Behind her Jiraiya was making tsk-ing noises, sounding like he was starting to feel almost as frustrated as she herself was feeling.

At first Naruto had been excited when Jiraiya had said that they would be going to the festival. Obviously she'd been either entirely misguided or perhaps mad, because thus far the festival had largely been one source of frustration after another. Experiences that she'd had the delightful luck to experience so far had included a seemingly unending stream of young guys leering at her figure, which was barely concealed beneath Jiraiya's skimpy idea of a kimono, and a series of near-impossibly difficult twists upon the usual festival games. Maybe the letch was right, bmaybe this too was great training, but she'd come out to the festival expecting to have fun, not to struggle with yet more of his insane training plans.

"Yes you need to be focused," Jiraiya started, obviously not able to hold back from lecturing her any longer. He was using different words, but still saying the same thing he'd been telling her for the last hour and a half, "But you can't afford to focus too hard on any one part of your opponent. You need to see all their body at once. You need to see all the holes in their defence in case they close one of them as you begin to attack. You need to be able to watch every part of them as you attack so you can spot any warning signs that might alert you that you are being led into a trap, or that your opponents movements are a feint. You throw yourself too fully into your attacks, and must learn how to commit to the attack without losing sight of the whole of the battle."

She nodded, but it wasn't a nod of agreement, more a nod that meant 'get of my damn back, I'm trying.'

Be focused without focussing. It sounded great, but she still wasn't sure exactly how you were supposed to do it though.

"Now."

She chose her target in an instant and swung.

"Up!"

She tried to shift it, and the hammer met an empty hole.

Damn, damn, damn, damn. She was sure that that Kappa had been on its way up when she'd started swinging.

Jiraiya didn't say anything this time, and really he didnt have to. She already knew what she was doing wrong, she just wasnt sure yet how she was supposed to fix it. No doubt if she didn;t eventually get it then Jiraiya would find some way to make her life miserable for the failure. The old letch knew exactly what buttons to press, and he seemed more than happy enough to do so, as a strange form of punishment, or to keep her on her toes, or just becaise he felt like it.

Speaking of which...

A warm and intimate touch upon her hip, unexpected and barely muffled by the thin silks of her tight fitting kimono. Jiraiya had been keeping the leering yopung men away from her while she practiced, but just because he was protecting her from others didn't mean he wasn't going to take liberties.

She whirled on him rapidly, brandishing her hammer menacingly at him and watching in satisfaction as he gave out a squark of surprise and disapeared downwards in a flash of coloured clothes.

He...?

The sight before her wasn't at all what she'd expected.

"Hinata..?" Naruto wondered aloud. The other girl was on her rump now, looking eve more surprised than Naruto felt, and more than a little upset.

"Ano... Gomen... I... I didn't mean..."

"Nah..." Naruto interrupted, brushing the appoloigies away wih a wave of her hands. Shit. The last thing Hinata needed was this, ewspecially with how her cousin had treated her at the preliminaries, "I'm sorry. I thought you were the dumb old pervert. Sometimes he grabs my ass, and you know... stuff..."

Hinata's face immediately went bright red, although Naruto couldn't work out if it was because she was mad with the letch, or because she was worried that sort of thing could happen to her. With a girl like Hinata, probably the later...

"Don't worry about that," she hastened to reassure Hinata, "I'll pound him to the floor before I let him touch you..."

That only seemed to make her redder though.

"Ano... you get that... jealous?"

"What?" That didn't seem to make the slightest sense, but then that was girls all over. She reached down, offering the other girl a hand to help her up. "Anyway, I'm sorry for startling you. I dodn't mean ta startle you or anything. It's good ta see you byt he way. What are ya doing out of hospital?"

Really, it _was _good to see her; better than Naruto would have guessed. He'd known Hinata for years now, as a name and a quiet shape sometime lurking nearby, but not really as a person. When she'd stepped down to fight Neji during the end of the second part of the Chuunin exam he had recognised her as a classmate, but as little more than that. It was only when Neji's harsh treatment and harsher words had begun that he had truly started to notice her.

At first it seemed that she would just crumble into tiny little peices, but all it took was a few encouraging words from Naruto and she had rallied well enough to stand up to her ass of a cousin. She had rallied enough to stand there defiant while he rained more and more blows upon her until the judges had been to interveine to avoid her death. Naruto felt a little guilty about that really. Perhaps if she hadn'r encouraged the Hyuuga girl then she wouldn't have been anyway near so badly injured. She felt guilty about ever having put her in that situation, and yet somehow she felt a little proud of her for it too.

Either way she thought about it, she had to defend Hinata's honour by pounding that jerk. If her family could be so cruel to her, and if it took so little encouragement to re-energise her, then, well... Actually Naruto wasn't sure what that meant at all, but it worried her on a level she couldn't truly understand. Someone was was going to have to look out for the quiet girl and it might as well be her, because after all, that was Naruto's _nindo_.

Naruto tried to dislodge such heavy thoughts from her mind. Hinata was looking fantastic, and that was reason to be happy. She'd never thought the girl good improve so fast as this, and shewas glad she'd had to see how much the girl had improved.

There were other reasons to be happy about seeing Hinata too.

Naruto couldn't help but notice the other girl's kimono. The quality of the fabric and styling came as no surprise, and neither did the predominantly lilac colouring of the garment. These things were to be expected of a girl with Hinata's tastes, and with her prestigious family. What was surprising however, was the flashes of her bare calves and thighs that the Kimono kept offering, and the plunging neckline that offered a glimpse of more than a little cleavage. It was a sight that put an immediate smile on Naruto's face.

After all, she'd thought she'd be the only person dressed like that tonight.

If a girl like Hinata could dress like that too, then maybe it really was okay. Maybe stupid old Jiraiya hadn't just been being a perverted old letch again this time. Sure, not many people were dressed like this, but if it was okay for a shy girl like Hinata then that made her feel a whole lot better about it all.

"Anyway, I'm glad you are dressed like that Hinata."

Hinata nodded, and NAruto couldn't help but notice that the redness of her face was starting compete with some of the nearby red paper lanterns.

"Ano... I.. I um.. I thought maybe you and I could... together..."

Hinata had a pretty funny way of talking sometimes, and it took Naruto to transform the collection of words into a working sentance inside her own head.

"Oh? Oh! Yeah, sorry sure. Of course we can. I mean the old letch keeps goign on about how he doesn't like to take students, but I reckon we can convince him to let you train with us!"

"Oh." Her head drooped as she spoke, and Naruto found himself hastening to reassure her.

"Ahh, don't worry about it. I'll convince him and if even if I can't convince him to let all three of us do it together, then we could sneak off and justthe two of us could do it."

"Oh.. Naruto..."

Hinata's voice was stuttery and hesitant, but a huge smile was opening up on her face, so Naruto knew that she'd said the right thing. Hinata's cheeks were a healthy and happy vibrant pink too. Maybe too vibrant a colour actually. It spread to cover her entire face, and extended down her neck at at such a rapid rate that Naruto began to worry for the girl.

"Are you alright Hinata?"

She moistened her lips, opened her still smiling mouth and made a strange sort of gurgling noise.

"Hinata are you okay?" Naruto stepped forwards and laid the back of her hand against Hinata's forehead.

She was a bit warm, but not so much so that Naruto was worried about her having a fever. Far more worrying than her temperature, infact, was the loud thumping noise she made when she abruptly collapsed onto the floor.

Apparently Hinata still had a little bit of fainting left in her system.

---


End file.
